


I dream of Minhyuk

by LikeSatellites



Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Genie/Djinn, Forgive Me, Joohyuk Bingo, M/M, hopefully it's still cute, this is unfinished but i want to post it bc idk how to keep going
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-29
Updated: 2018-11-29
Packaged: 2019-09-02 09:45:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16784494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LikeSatellites/pseuds/LikeSatellites
Summary: “Right. So...when you say Master...what you mean is?” Jooheon kicks his foot at a piece of gravel beneath his swing.“I’m a Genie,” Minhyuk says, like you’d say doctor or chiropractor or paleontologist.“A genie.”“Genie,” Minhyuk corrects. “Capital G. My kind are very ancient. We earned the capital G.”“How did you even hear the lowercasing in my speech?”Minhyuk smirks. “Genie, remember?”





	I dream of Minhyuk

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: i...  
> am ashamed.  
> Listen!!! I had such fun starting this story and then i realized i trapped myself by writing 4K words of lead up but i hadn't planned anything for after that would equal that amount of words...  
> I didn't proof this, so it's probably garbage. I have no idea if/when I'll finish this, but I had to get it out for the bingo peeps because I MADE A PROMISE.  
> Honestly just...don't read this lol

Jooheon’s grandfather is dead.

He looks down at the text message again. 

{Unknown Number 2:47pm}: Hello Mr. Jooheon Lee-Yoo. This is Hyunwoo Son from the Legal Offices of Son and Son and Son. We have your grandfather’s will here, and it seems you have not come to collect the belongings left to you. I’ve attached the Google Map directions to our offices, so at your earliest convenience please come by to pick them up. Very sorry for your loss.

Jooheon keeps reading the message. He doesn’t have a grandfather.

Well, you know. Of course he does. He has parents, and they were born of their own parents, and thus Jooheon has grandparents, but Jooheon has never met his parents, let alone their parents. Jooheon was adopted by a nice gay couple on his third birthday, after two years in foster care. And Kihyun and Hoseok are great. Great parents, truly. Most boys would kill to have two dads. Double the playing catch. Double the proud back-pats when you get good grades. Double the loud boisterous cheers at baseball games. 

And, well, Kihyun and Hoseok aren’t  _ quite _ like that. As far as parenting goes, they’re pretty genderless. Kihyun makes the chore wheel, preps the meals for the week, and mostly supports the family financially. Hoseok carries the heavy things, offers to handle the more sensitive parent talks, and is a dance instructor part-time out of their townhouse garage. 

Jooheon is in university now, home on Thanksgiving break, and his grandfather is dead. 

When he walks into the kitchen, Kihyun is trying to wash the dishes, arms submerged in hot soapy water up to where the turquoise gloves end at his elbows. Hoseok is behind him, pressed up against his back, blowing air into Kihyun’s ear to make him irritated. They’ve always been like this. Both madly in love and also almost-always bickering. 

“I swear to all that is Holy, Hoseok Lee, I am not above splashing all of this old crusty spaghetti sauce soap water into your ugly mug,” Kihyun hisses, agitating the surface of the water threateningly. 

“Don’t swear on my mother, Kihyun, you know how I hate that,” Hoseok whines, completely serious, and then Kihyun spins around, wet gloves dripping as he folds them behind Hoseok’s head and kisses him. 

“Sorry, my love,” Kihyun coos. “I didn’t mean it.”

“You could make it up to me,” Hoseok says, cupping his palm over Kihyun’s crotch, and that’s when Jooheon blurts: “MY GRANDPA IS DEAD.”

Hoseok squeaks, rearing back from Kihyun like his hand had caught fire against Kihyun’s jean zipper. “Baby! Please! We’ve talked about this. Gently announce your presence first. You know I have a weak heart.”

Jooheon holds up his phone, and Kihyun snaps off the rubber gloves to grab it from him and take a look. 

“Huh,” Kihyun says. “Well I know this firm, so this isn’t a scam. I’ll give Hyunwoo a call and verify this. Your birth parents were pretty young when they had you, so it wouldn’t be completely out of the question that their parents knew you’d be put up for adoption and somehow kept you in their wills.”

“It’s probably just a family ring or something,” Hoseok says, petting Jooheon’s hair gently. “Do you want us to go with you?”

Jooheon shakes his head. “No, it’s fine. Their offices are close to Changkyun’s building, so I’ll just drag him with me or something.”

“You sure, baby?” Hoseok asks, pouting. “I know this can be hard. Ki and I read all the adoption books about--”

“Hoseok,” Kihyun cuts in, pinching Hoseok’s lips with his fingertips. “He’s an adult now. Remember the exercises.”

Hoseok draws in a shaky breath and nods, zoning out for a meditative second. “Okay. I’m good. I’m good.” 

Kihyun smiles proudly and brushes his thumb over Hoseok’s cheek. “Good boy.”

{Joohunnit 1hunnit 3pm}: tmrw youre comin with me to a thing ok

{IAMwatIAM 3:01pm}: cool is it dangerous

{Joohunnit 1hunnit 3:01pm}: nah probs not

{IAMwatIAM 3:02pm}: can we MAKE it dangerous

{Joohunnit 1hunnit 3:02pm}: ill be at your place tmrw at noon plz be awake 

{Joohunnit 1hunnit 3:03pm}: AND CLOTHED

{IAMwatIAM 3:03pm}: this friendship is so stifling ::anguish::

Changkyun grew up in one of those low-income buildings in Flushing. The ones where roaches crawl over the door buzzer, and you have to shoo them away so you can get into the building. The ones where grandmas in the floor lounges sing loud Chinese opera into old karaoke machines at all hours of the day. The ones where people wait fifty years on a waitlist just to get an apartment, constantly hoping someone has finally died. 

Jooheon scrapes a roach off the buzzer with a dried leaf and throws it into the bushes by the door. “Yah, Changkyun Im, you better be ready to go.”

Changkyun buzzes him in but doesn’t say anything. Jooheon sighs and assumes that means he is not in fact ready at all. 

Changkyun’s mom answers the door when Jooheon gets off the elevator on the tenth floor and knocks. “Hello sweet honey!”

Jooheon gives a short little bow of his head. “Good afternoon, Ms. Im. Is Changkyun up?”

She scoffs and tosses her head in the direction of Changkyun’s bedroom. “I give you permission to throttle him if needed.”

“Is he...naked?”

She shrugs. “He gets that from his father, God rest his soul.”

Changkyun’s father is not dead. He moved to Florida and married the woman who used to give him massages at the airport on his business trips.

Jooheon just hums in reply and slips his feet into a pair of IKEA guest slippers, padding unsteadily over uneven layers of rugs and carpeting to Changkyun’s door, which is still wrapped in Caution tape from middle school. 

The door creaks as it swings open, and Changkyun is sitting, naked, on top of his covers, playing bejeweled. Jooheon shrieks and launches himself onto the bed, pinching Changkyun’s skinny calves and biceps, and Changkyun flails around, howling. 

“I’m sorry I said I want to fuck your dads while I was drunk at the fraternity formal last year! Please stop punishing me for it! Please stop pinching my delicate baby flesh! Please!” Changkyun wails, rolling around while Jooheon pinches him right on the asscheek. 

“You are a curse! Why are we best friends?!” Jooheon sobs, collapsing against the pile of pokemon plushies against Changkyun’s headboard that he uses as pillows. 

“Because I stopped you from eating glue in elementary school when those bullies said it was marshmallow fluff,” Changkyun replies, rubbing at his reddened skin with a wince. 

“Why did you have to bring up the dad thing again? I was almost over it,” Jooheon huffs, grabbing an eevee and squeezing it against his face with a sigh.

“Sorry. I think I had a dream about them last night,” Changkyun says, and Jooheon screams into the eevee plush’s velvety fur. “I think they asked me to be their sex toy. In the dream.”

“You could’ve just not kept talking,” Jooheon sighs. 

“Sorry. It’s coming back to me now. I sat on Kihyun’s dick while Hoseok--”

“Changkyun, my grandpa is dead.”

“What? Which one? Lee grandpa or Yoo grandpa?” Changkyun asks, sitting up, blastoise hiding his crotch. 

“No, like... my birth family grandpa.”

“Huh,” Changkyun says, sliding off the bed to hop into a pair of tight skinny jeans, boxerless. Just balls against denim. Jooheon thinks Changkyun is a hard masochist. “Wonder how they found you.”

“That’s a good question. Kihyun called the law office last night and verified it, though. The guy left me some kind of heirloom.”

“Not money? Bummer. We could’ve finally fulfilled our dream of owning an alpaca farm upstate, charging hipsters thousands of dollars to stay in canvas tents on our property,” Changkyun sighs wistfully. 

“No money that I know of. Just some personal items. Who knows? I just have to go get them and then we can go play Overwatch at my place or something,” Jooheon replies, as Changkyun zips up his NY Jets hoodie over an old H.O.T. t-shirt. 

“I probably shouldn’t be around your dads right now,” Changkyun says casually, fixing his hair in the little dusty mirror on his dresser. “Okay let’s go get your inheritance.”

The Law Offices of Son and Son and Son are right off Main St. in Flushing, in an inconspicuous building bordered by a Kung Fu Tea and one of those cell phone repair places that charges half the price of anyone in Manhattan. Jooheon looks down at his cracked iPhone screen and considers stopping back in later. 

“I want bubble tea,” Changkyun says, sniffing the sugary tapioca air that lingers in the stairway of the law office. 

“You’re like a child,” Jooheon replies, buzzing the bell beside the glass doors that lead to the main office lobby. The door opens in front of them, and the youngest Son, Hyunwoo, welcomes them in. He’s handsome. Tan, with well-kempt dark hair and a suit that looks tailored for his exact thick body. Jooheon watches as Changkyun takes Hyunwoo into his little gremlin brain and nearly dribbles some spit onto himself. Jooheon jabs his elbow in Changkyun’s stomach. “Hi, sorry we’re a bit late.  _ Someone _ wasn’t ready this morning. I’m Jooheon Lee-Yoo. Here for...whatever it is my birth grandpa left me.”

“Ah, yes, nice to meet you, Mr. Lee-Yoo,” Hyunwoo says, shaking Jooheon’s hand briefly. “Follow me, please.”

The office itself is small. There are four rooms in total on the floor. Three personal offices (the Sons’) and one large conference room that seemingly overlooks Main St., considering all the honking Jooheon can hear. Hyunwoo leads them to his own personal office, gesturing to two small armchairs across from his desk. There’s a safe in the bookshelf, and Hyunwoo spends a brief minute fumbling with it, having (Jooheon assumes) forgotten the combination for a few tries. He eventually gets it open, and reaches in to grab one small item and one much larger item wrapped in tissue paper. 

“Item one,” Hyunwoo says, gently unwrapping the paper, “is your grandfather’s favorite fountain pen.”

Jooheon slides it across the desk toward himself. “Okay. That’s pretty cool, I guess.” 

The paper crinkles as Hyunwoo pushes the second item toward Jooheon. “I’m not allowed to unwrap this second one. The will specifically states you are the only one who can touch the item directly.”

“That’s...kinda weird. But okay,” Jooheon says, peeling off the bit of tape keeping the paper in place. A bit of wood peeks out from the top. “Is this...a lantern?” He rips the paper away, and it is. It’s an old traditional Korean lantern. Intricate wood-carved top, made to look like a roof, with little red-stained dragons at each corner. The light panels are cloudy off-white, with cherry blossom and lotus designs painted on. 

“Whoa that’s sweet,” Changkyun says, reaching out, and Jooheon frantically tugs the lantern to his chest, away from Changkyun’s grubby fingers.

“It says only I can touch it,” Jooheon huffs, cradling the lantern against him like a delicate newborn child. 

“Whoa, touchy, okay,” Changkyun laughs, dropping his hand back into his lap. “You think it’s worth money?”

“I’m not gonna  _ sell it _ ,” Jooheon says, puffing out his cheeks petulantly. “This was left to me specially.”

“You can buy one of those at almost any traditional goods store in this neighborhood, Honey,” Changkyun says slowly. 

“No, this one is special,” Jooheon says, attempting to shove and hide the lantern under his coat. 

“Right then,” Hyunwoo says, handing Jooheon his business card, which Changkyun promptly swipes and inserts into his own jean pocket. 

Jooheon stands promptly, lantern still cocooned beneath the fleece of his coat. “Good doing business,” he says, nearly tripping over the electrical wiring by the doorway as he attempts to smoothly and swiftly exit the office. 

“Where are you going? We still have to get milk tea. Jooheo-- _ very nice to meet you, Hyunwoo. I’m sure you’ll hear from me soon _ \--JOOHEON!!” 

Jooheon is storming down the stairs and out onto Main St. An old lady selling  _ joong  _ on the sidewalk stares at the misshapen lump beneath his coat as he rushes toward the playground by the old public elementary school. There are a few kids clambering on the jungle gym, but the swings are free, so Jooheon snags one and carefully pulls the lantern from beneath his coat. 

“Why am I the only one allowed to touch you, hm?” 

His fingers touch the ornate wood surrounding the thin panels where the light would shine through if it were lit. It’s smooth, with a few dings from being handled over the years. It’s clearly  _ super fuckin’ old _ . Jooheon can tell just by running his fingertips over the carved dragons at the top that this is an original. It hasn’t been altered at all, and this is real wood. Not lacquered plastic made to look like wood. 

A faint heat starts pressing up against Jooheon’s palms from the light panels. There’s a little ball of light dimly shining from the center of the lantern as Jooheon brings it close to his face to try to peer inside. “What the fuuuuuck? Are you heat-activated? I don’t think they had that technology when you were made…”

There’s a second where the light dims down to nothing, and Jooheon’s heart gives a sad little tug, but then the lantern grows hot. So hot. So hot that Jooheon wants to drop it to the painted asphalt beneath his feet, but he can’t. It’s like his fingers and palms have fused to the wood. Jooheon wants to scream, and the noise starts budding up in his throat, but he can’t make noise. 

The light is blinding now, like the kind of light made by old lighthouses, so powerful and bright they can cut through the thickest fog, the darkest stormy nights at sea. 

And then the lantern falls to the ground, gently wobbling for a second before righting itself. Perfectly fine. Perfectly still.

“Jooheon, right?”

Now Jooheon shrieks.

The kids on the jungle gym look over at him, laugh a bit, and then continue on their way.

Jooheon turns his head just so, and the ball of light is now a person. Repeat: the ball of light is now a person. 

It looks like a man. Ambiguously aged--maybe as young as Jooheon but hard to tell when his skin is literally made of golden amber flames of light. 

“You okay, Jooheon? I figured this form would be better. Since you are so young.”

“I’m twenty-one,” Jooheon says, wondering why he’s talking to this flame man. Did Hyunwoo’s office have asbestos? Does Jooheon have mesothelioma? Is he entitled to legal compensation? 

“Right. As I said. Very young.” The man extends a hand. “I’m Minhyuk.”

Jooheon looks at Minhyuk’s hand. Light ripples over his skin, flickering like the tips of a flame. There’s a gold sheen to him, tinged with bits of orange and red and even blue in places. 

“I won’t burn you. You’re my Master,” Minhyuk adds, waving his flame hand in the air between their swings. 

“I’m your what now?” Jooheon asks, as Minhyuk reaches over to take Jooheon’s hand to shake it. 

“As of that handshake, you are officially my new Master. Like your grandfather before you. It was his plan that I’d go to you upon his passing. It took you quite a while to retrieve me, though, didn’t it?”

“I didn’t...I didn’t know him. I’m adopted.”

“Adopted?” Minhyuk asks, tipping his sharp golden face to the side. “Ah, you mean like you were taken in by another family? What happened to your parents?”

Jooheon shrugs. “That’s a good question. I have new parents now. Kihyun and Hoseok.”

Minhyuk blinks slowly, eyes glowing bright, unsettling orange. “Those are both men, yes?”

“Yeah. Two dads.” Jooheon lifts a hand, twirling his finger in the air in mock excitement. 

“Two dads,” Minhyuk repeats. “Fascinating. Well. I’m glad to finally meet you, Jooheon. Your grandfather was a good man.”

“Right. So...when you say  _ Master _ ...what you mean is?” Jooheon kicks his foot at a piece of gravel beneath his swing. 

“I’m a Genie,” Minhyuk says, like you’d say  _ doctor _ or  _ chiropractor _ or  _ paleontologist.  _

“A genie.”

“Genie,” Minhyuk corrects. “Capital G. My kind are very ancient. We earned the capital G.”

“How did you even hear the lowercasing in my speech?”

Minhyuk smirks. “Genie, remember?”

Jooheon scoffs, rubbing at his face with his hands. “I have mesothelioma, don’t I? Or a brain tumor? This is the moment in all the dramas when they find out they have a brain tumor. Kihyun is gonna  _ kill me _ if I have a brain tumor before getting my degree.”

“I’m afraid I don’t follow.”

“I’m obviously hallucinating. You aren’t real.”

“Sure I am. You just touched me. Would you like me to touch you again?” Minhyuk stands from the swing, though it’s less like standing and more like just shifting in the air. 

“No, please,” Jooheon says, raising his hands up in front of him protectively. “Don’t. Touch me.”

“Are you frightened of me? Would you like me to be less frightening?”

Jooheon laughs. “Sure. Of course I would.”

Minhyuk’s body shifts, shrinks, and suddenly he’s a small orange kitten, eyes glowing golden yellow. He leaps onto Jooheon’s lap. His little kitty lips part, and he says, “Now I’m less frightening?”

Jooheon stands from the swing, Minhyuk the Cat landing gracefully on his four little orange paws. “Okay. This is fine. This is fine. A Genie. I have a Genie? Wait, was that one of my three wishes? Making you a fucking cat?”

Minhyuk shifts back into his human form, running a hand through his always-gently-billowing golden hair. “I’m not sure why all you humans believe you only have three wishes. I am your Servant until your death, Jooheon. What would I do if you used all three wishes?”

“Common mythology, I guess. So, what, I just get infinite wishes?”

“To a degree,” Minhyuk replies, lips quirking at the corners. 

“What does that mean? To a degree?”

“At my discretion.”

“You’re my Servant, but you can also just...decide not to obey me?”

“Therein lies the difference between servitude and slavery, my dear Honey. Can I call you Honey?”

“I suppose I can’t stop you.”

“That’s the spirit!”

Kihyun is sitting at his desk in the living room when Jooheon sneaks in. Minhyuk is back in kitten form, curled up under Jooheon’s shirt and purring far too loudly and realistically. Kihyun barely looks up from his laptop, but he offers a wave. 

“Welcome home. How is Changkyun?”

“Still disgusting.”

“And still your best friend?”

Jooheon sighs. “I’ll be in my room.”

“I like Changkyun--I don’t know why you talk so negatively of him. He seems perfectly well-behaved to me,” Hoseok says, standing in the kitchen entryway with a tupperware of kimchi that he’s just plucking at with his fingers. 

“Only around you,” Jooheon huffs, dramatically swinging open his bedroom door. “Can I be alone now?”

“No one’s stopping you,” Kihyun says, in the Dad Voice.™ “But if you want our permission, despite the fact that you’re twenty-one years old, then sure. You may enter your own bedroom, Jooheon Lee-Yoo.”

“You guys are so lucky I never had a rebellion phase, okay,” Jooheon scoffs, pulling his bedroom door closed behind him. 

Jooheon lifts the hem of his shirt and Minhyuk flops to the floor in a heap of golden orange fur. It’s alarming how much he looks like a real cat, but there’s something much too wise in his little kitten eyes. 

“This is my room. You can hide here when I’m not home.”

Minhyuk leaps up onto Jooheon’s bed and presses his paws into the soft comforter, kneading it with his claws. Eventually he settles into a little fluffy round lump on Jooheon’s pillow. “No, I have to come with you always. What if you need something while you’re away?”

“I can’t just carry a cat around with me.”

“I can be anything, Honey. I’m made of Magic.” Minhyuk rolls onto his back, belly up to the ceiling. “What do you want for your first wish?”

“I want abs.”

Minhyuk suddenly shifts back to his ‘human’ form and crawls to the edge of the bed. He reaches a flickering flame hand toward the hem of Jooheon’s shirt. “Lemme see what we’re working with here.”

Jooheon flushes and pulls his shirt up over his head, tossing it aside. “Voila. Perfectly average in every way.”

Minhyuk scoots somehow closer until his fingers make contact with Jooheon’s bare stomach in all its soft shapelessness. “No can do on the abs, Honey. I like you just the way you are.”

Jooheon groans and catapults himself onto his back in the middle of his mattress, bouncing wildly on the springs. Minhyuk must shift back into a kitten because the next thing Jooheon knows, he’s falling asleep with Minhyuk curled up on his tummy. 

“You’re the worst inherited magical being with magical powers I’ve ever inherited.”

Minhyuk purrs and kneads his paws into Jooheon’s stomach. 

  
  
  


  
  
  
  
  
  



End file.
